The Photographers in Town

Before the war there were three photo studios in San Narciso. Lola Pinay patronized two of them, the Dimalanta Studio and the Minora Studio. Most, if not all, of these pictures are from them. Mr. Minora was Japanese and this was before the war. Since she was just a kid mom doesn’t know how he came to town, but he was well established and had been there as long as she could remember. He was an older gentleman, perhaps in his late forties at this time, single and with no kids, and spoke Ilocano with his Japanese accent. What she does remember is that Mr. Minora would bury one centavo coins around one of the coconut trees in his property. Whenever the kidz in the ‘hood would find Minora-san away from his house, they would dig up these coins. Mom doesn’t know why he did that.

When WWII broke out the occupying Japanese took Minora-san and he was never heard of again. I’d like to know whatever happened to him, if any of you out there know. A good guess is he was held as an interpreter and to gather information. I just finished the book Illustrado (winner of the Man Asia Prize) by Miguel Syjuco, a Filipino writer, and there’s a story about the protagonist’s family’s Japanese gardener, Yataro, who had been with them since before the war. When the war broke out, he turned out to be a spy and became a leader of the local occupying forces. He did, however, save the family from atrocities. Having just read the book maybe that’s why I’m curious about whatever happened to Minora-san.

Dolls arrived from Lolo Satur in America. Auntie Luz had Elizabeth, a rag doll, and mom had Shirley Temple, made of porcelain whose eyes could open and close. The tree next to Auntie Luz looks like a balimbing, although mom insists what they had in the backyard were chico and kamias. Maybe someone can identify the tree.